Bob Walkenhorst -venue Molloys irish Pub 2004

THE BEGINNER — Bob Walkenhorst When a great rock n’roll band comes to an end, where does the music go? Bob Walkenhorst, lead singer and songwriter of The Rainmakers, answers that question on his first solo CD, The Beginner. “I didn’t want to make a record where I set out to prove that I could single-handedly make up for the absence of the Rainmakers. Instead, I wanted this to be a discovery of what I truly sounded like without them.” In thirteen new (and very short) songs, Walkenhorst has pared his already elemental approach to song arrangements down to a skeletal acoustic guitar, bass, and drums, most often played by his one-man-band. Harmonica is the lead instrument of choice, with the notable exception of a honking sax solo by Johnny Reno on “Jan Vermeer,” a Chuck Berry-style rocker about the great Dutch painter. The only lead guitar solo on the CD is played by Kansas City guitarist Jack W. Hayhow, Jr., on another retro-rocker, “J-Walkers,” about the first band Walkenhorst ever heard. Vocal harmonies appear on only one song, “Just Leaving.” From the sparse instrumentation to the early-’60s-style extreme-stereo production, the overall sound of The Beginner is as much about what has not been recorded as it is about what you do hear.